"Remain," Kamahl said simply. His hand touched the beast, fingers barely spanning one scale. A spark leaped from human flesh to serpentine, reminding the giant beast who its creator was. "You are Verda, and you will remain here in Krosan to guard it from any invaders."
The serpent coiled slowly. Its body rose, loop on loop, as it listened. Verda's eyes met Kamahl's, and the man read the hunger there.
"You may not eat me. Nor may you eat mantis folk or druids or centaurs or any other thinking thing." The question remained, what might Verda eat? A hiss in Kamahl's right hand reminded him of a more pressing task. He glanced from the small snake to die hungry giant. "Wait, and do not eat."
Kamahl lifted high the other snake. "For you, I have even greater plans."
Power erupted from his palm, and flame mantled the snake. Scales burned and twisted, and flesh flared. Ribs exploded, sending gray smoke up through the air. While the first snake had swelled, this beast burst. Kamahl tried to drop the incendiary creature, but its flames expanded and took form, extending into a massive head. Rolling billows of orange grew into a huge body and tail. Heat and light solidified as scales of black and red. The crimson beast moved with volatile, darting motions.
"You are Roth. You will be my war steed," Kamahl said. He swung his hand out, and flame splashed over the fiery beast Roth hissed and recoiled, eyes burning in its skull.
"You must come with me-" Kamahl began, but before he could finish, Roth leaped upon Verda.
Jaws spread and clamped down on the great green snake. Teeth grated against feathery scales. Verda responded in kind, wrapping its powerful body in a constricting grip. The reptiles wrestled as before, though now each creature weighed a hundred tons. The massive boles of the Gorgon Mount shuddered. A tail crashed to ground beside Kamahl and left a trough as wide as he was.
Kamahl stepped back. He should have foreseen this. Verda was hungry, and Roth was angry or perhaps amorous. They would tear each other apart unless they found another focus.
Roth's fiery head darted in for another bite, but Verda reared back. Massive red jaws clamped on a rotten bough and shattered it. Roth hurled itself after its mate. From its gaping mouth tumbled wood and softer things-furry things.
A colony of squirrels had lived in the hollow bow, and they pattered one by one to the ground. They had been feasting on huge hunks of nut and scrambled to recover their spilled hoard.
Kamahl smiled and walked slowly toward the scolding squirrels. He grasped a large nut and lifted it, raising also the squirrel who had claimed it. The creature chattered furiously, attracting the attention of its comrades. Squirrels leaped for the stolen nut and clambered up Kamahl's arm. Vital power jagged into them.
In moments, they had grown to the size of badgers. Kamahl shook them off. Still they grew, clawing despondently at nuts that seemed to shrink in their midst. Squirrels as large as ponies, then as horses…
Even Kamahl backed away.
The serpents had gone ominously silent. Roth and Verda, necks entwined, stared at the brood of giant squirrels. Forked tongues darted out to taste the air. As one, the green and red creatures slithered toward their prey.
"You are to eat, and cavort, and flee," Kamahl said to the squirrels. They had noticed the serpents' attention and had gone still.
"You are to reproduce and to feed my guardians, but only when they deserve it."
One squirrel let out a tearing shriek. It hopped away, shaking the ground. Others did likewise. For a moment, there was no sky, but only furry bellies.
Snake heads darted in behind. Razor teeth snapped down on nothing. Had the giant serpents not been intertwined, each would have gotten a meal. As it was, they tumbled petulantly across each other while giant squirrels hurdled away. Roth and Verda slithered afterward.
"Eat," commanded Kamahl, "then return to your duty. Verda, you will begin to patrol. Roth, you will find me wherever I roam."
The hisses that replied were sullen but affirmative.
Kamahl's face shone with power as his creations pursued each other across the Gorgon Mount. He turned and walked through the wood. New creatures waited eagerly within his fingers.
What power he holds over beasts!
The First watched Verda and Roth slither into the distance. He would have to avoid them. Snakes could taste the very air, and they would sense him unless he masked his scent among rotting things. Luckily, there were plenty of rotting things in this rampant forest.
The First slid from his hideout and followed Kamahl at a distance. The man might have been raising an army, but the First would turn that army to his own purposes. As he stalked, his smile was like a dagger across his face.
CHAPTER EIGHT: BUYING THE SWAMP
Huge black shapes moved across the vaporous swamp. They seemed giant water striders, their long abdomens dragging over the surface and their rodlike legs patiently plying the muck. The shapes weren't spiders but barges, loaded gunwale to gunwale with murmurous beasts. Long poles rhythmically reached down, found the bottom, shoved along slowly, and rose dripping. Hundreds of barges wove among low islets, down crocodile channels, and toward a broad central island.
Phage stood at the prow of the first vessel, her command ship. The barge was loaded with cut stone for the new colony-no livestock or slaves, who might die from her touch. Wary of their mistress, the five pole men gave her a wide berth. They remembered what had happened to the sixth.
Eyes narrowing, Phage peered through the mist. It was as thick and white as milk, curdling along still channels. Ahead lay open water, and beyond it appeared a low, grassy headland.
She pointed, her black silk sleeve cutting a stark silhouette against the fog. "There." The word was spoken quietly, but it was undoubtedly a command.
The pole men responded, hauling, positioning, pushing. The barge turned slightly and drove toward the shore.
Phage knew that land. She had seen it in the vapor of the First's dream. It looked no different here and now. Before her lay the island primeval, as it had looked since it arose from the swamp. In her mind, though, she saw the island transformed: the grounds of a new coliseum. It would draw the whole world. These waterways would throng with pleasure craft. Those archipelagos would bear a string of bridges, which would in turn bear wagons and carriages and foot traffic. The very skies would throng with griffons and winged steeds.
Phage saw it all. Her mind traded equally in memories and visions. The coliseum already existed, for the First willed it. While Phage lived, the dream coliseum was real.
As the barge approached the shore, a veil of mist slid gently back. It revealed, at the height of the island, a small, stockaded village. This had not been part of the dream. The land had been virginal, ready for exploitation. Phage stared at the stockade of woven boughs, the low huts beyond, the sod roofs, the fire holes that trickled smoke, the small figures in the crude watchtowers.
She drew a breath. The village did not exist. As far as the First was concerned, it was not there. It was no more impediment than the tender grass.
The barge landed. To stem, men leaned on their poles. To fore, men dropped anchor and slid the gangplank.
With her eyes fixed on the village, Phage descended the gangplank. She set foot on spongy ground-mud covered in long grass. The touch of her feet blackened the blades. She would leave burned-out footprints all the way up the hill. It didn't matter. Soon this would be a beach of white sand above a clear-water lagoon. The First had sent a whole arsenal of flesh eaters to scour the muck and cleanse the waters. That was work for another day. Today Phage would be the flesh eater.